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Hong Kong people

like jumping on the

bandwagon of shar-

ing trendy food

puts many food and

beverage outlets

into death

Wong uses purple potato juice to make the drink more photogenic
Instagram and Facebook. If the bev-
erage appears to be photogenic, they
will think it is worth to have a try,”
Leung says. She says she cannot dif-
ferentiate the taste of the brown sugar
bubble tea from different shops so
that it is difficult for this industry to
be sustainable, no matter how tasty
the beverage is.
Regarding the “camera eats first”
phenomenon, Fran-
cisco Cisternas, as-
sistant professor
of the Marketing
Department at
the Chinese Uni-
versity of Hong
Kong, suggests this
is a way for the Francisco Cisternas Bubble tea shops encourage people to follow their Facebook pages
young generation
to search for independence and estab- tion than other forms of marketing,” to be careful not to hurt what people
lish a social identity. The reward they says Cisternas. Although it allows the want to see. Because this may have a
get from social media, in the form of shops to pick up free publicity, Cister- negative effect on their own business
likes, comments, and sharing, is im- nas mentions the risk of losing control model,” Cisternas adds.
mediate, and it reinforces this behav- of the advertising content by using
iour. Foodstagram promotion.
Cisternas believes Foodstagrams In the long term, the incentive of Edited by Fangdong Bai
play a determinant role in the evalua- foodies to cooperate with bubble tea
tion of a beverage shop. “Recommen- shop is complicated, he says. “On one
dations from a friend have a signifi- hand they can be charged for giving
cantly stronger impact on consumers’ preference to bubble tea shop in their
purchase intention and brand evalua- page. But on the other hand, they have